The present invention relates to a device for feeding correctly orientated socks to a processing station.
It is known that the toe of socks is generally still open when said socks are unloaded from the machine that forms them, and that said socks must be subsequently subjected to darning or looping, which closes the toe, thus obtaining the finished product.
The socks that leave the machine that forms them are usually grouped and arranged in containers to be transferred to the machine that darns or loops the toe.
The darning or looping machine is loaded manually by an operator, who removes the socks from the transfer container and correctly places the toe of the socks on the machine.
The socks very often reach the operator assigned to loading the darning or looping machine in a disorderly arrangement; therefore the loading of said machine can entail times which inevitably do not allow to fully utilize the production potential of modern darning or looping machines and significantly affect the overall production costs of socks.
The aim of the present invention is to provide a device which can feed a processing station with socks which are correctly orientated, i.e., ready to be loaded onto the darning or looping machine so as to significantly reduce the time required by the loading operation.
Within the scope of this aim, an object of the invention is to provide a device which, by reducing the time required to load the socks onto the darning or looping machines, allows to fully utilize the production potential of said machines.
These and other objects which will become better apparent hereinafter are achieved by a device for feeding correctly orientated socks to a processing station, characterized in that it comprises: a laying unit, which can be fed with a sock and is adapted to lay out the sock in a substantially horizontal direction; a conveyor, which is arranged below said laying unit and forms a substantially horizontal resting surface for the sock that falls from said laying unit after being laid out and can be actuated in order to produce the advancement of the sock in a direction which is parallel to the longitudinal extension of the sock, with its toe directed in the advancement direction; and a positioner, which is provided with means for gripping the sock at its toe as it arrives from said conveyor and can be actuated so as to arrange the sock so that it hangs vertically at its toe.